The Steampunk Trilogy

by Paul Di Filippo

  Walt seemingly took no offense at the half-veiled slight. “A splendid suggestion. Come, Emily—let us visit our feathered friends and study their wing’d purposes.”

  When they reached the edge of the Common, Emily felt better. She sought to explain what had come over her, not wishing Walt to think her a typical faint-hearted spinster.

  “The sight of that slimy spiritual stuff affected me queerly, Walt. The notion that it all came out of the gross corporeal form of Madame Selavy—I fear it was too much for me.”

  “I recall that I too felt somewhat unnerved when I first witnessed a materialization. But such feelings pass, when you realize that nothing that happens on this earth is unnatural. Everything is good in its place, and nothing is out of its place.”

  Walt’s careless admission that he had witnessed an ideoplastic extrusion reawakened in Emily all the repugnance she had experienced upon first learning of Madame Selavy’s promiscuous behavior. Stiffening and stopping, she slipped out from Walt’s embrace and turned to confront him.

  “I suppose you don’t think there’s anything immoral then in helping to milk that trollop as if she were a prize Holstein! You’ve doubtlessly enjoyed such scandalous behavior often enough yourself! Why, it’s, it’s—positively Mormon!”

  Walt sighed, and, despite knowing herself in the right, Emily felt saddened to have hurt him. His patient smile that followed somewhat heartened her.

  “Morality. I had hoped you were above such small conceptions, Emily. Is the sea moral, or the tree-toad? Is the running blackberry moral? Morality is the bane of small minds, to paraphrase my friend Emerson. I simply eat what is put on my plate, without recourse to praise or blame, thanks or curses. Life is much better lived in such a fashion. And as for our poor, much-hounded friends at Salt Lake—who can say that their way is not as good as—or better than—ours? It’s more natural, at least. Does not a single stallion quicken many mares? But if it will put your mind at ease, I am happy to assure you that I myself have never materially participated in assisting Madame Selavy to, ah, form her ejectamenta. That task belongs to Davis and the professor.”

  Walt’s words left Emily feeling both chagrined and relieved, embarrassed and reassured. She was glad that Walt had not participated intimately in the materializations; however, his cavalier attitude toward convention was hard to swallow for one who—however independent—had been reared all her life amongst the contaminating small minds of Amherst.

  In the end, Emily let her predisposition toward Whitman have the ascendancy. He was a Poet, and such could not be judged by normal scales.

  They resumed their walk, covering the distance back to The Evergreens in silence. Passing through the luxuriant grounds, they reached the ostrich pen. The enormous birds crowded to the fence to greet Whitman, who responded by petting them affectionately.

  “I think I could turn and live with the animals,” said the man, “they are so placid and self-contain’d. They do not sweat and whine about their condition. They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins. And above all, they do not make me sick discussing their duty to God!”

  So neatly did these sentiments tally with Emily’s own—she who had oft imagined herself a bee or spider—that she dropped a silent tear or two of joy. When she found her voice, she asked her companion, “I still do not understand what part these glorious fowls play in this expedition, Walt.”

  “You are aware that our motive power for breaching the dimensions comes from the miracle element, electricity—specifically, a set of Voltaic piles, are you not?” I am now.

  “Well, the piles hold but a single charge—enough, perhaps, to send us to Summerland, but not to return. They must be continually recharged, by means of a treadmill-powered generator. The ostriches shall serve that purpose.”

  “But why such exotic draft animals? Surely a horse or two would have done as well. . . .”

  “It was instructions from Princess Pink Cloud, Madame’s spirit guide. We were informed by the ghost that ostriches were the only animal psychically fitted to make the transition with us to the spirit domain. There is something especially ethereal about them.”

  “I can believe it,” said Emily. “Just look at them!”

  “They are beautiful, aren’t they? I’ve named them all after the female cantatrices of my favorite operas, for some quality they possess reminds me of those prima donnas.” Walt assumed an air of mock formality. “Miss Dickinson, may I present you to my ladies? Here is Donna Anna and Zerlina, Marguerite and Elsa, Lucia and Alisa, Barbarina, Violetta, Norma, Gilda and Magdalena.”

  Emily curtsied. “Charmed, I’m certain.”

  They both began to laugh then, Emily’s titters gradually escalating to match Walt’s roaring. They were forced to retreat to a seat which circled the bole of a large spreading elm until the shared fit of hilarity had passed.

  When Emily could speak again, she said, “Walt, dear, I know why my brother and Davis and Crookes are participating in this expedition. But what are your motives? And what of your young companion, Henry?”

  Walt coughed, then said, somewhat disingenuously, thought Emily, “Ah, Hen, he’s a splendid lad. He’s made much of himself, considering his orphan status and rough upbringing. I’ve known him since we worked on the Eagle together, lo, these ten years and more. Hen was a printer’s devil while I was the editor, but we never let that come between us. We were always the best of friends. There is a rare degree of adhesiveness between us, and he is along simply because I value his company.”

  Emily recognized in Walt’s mention of “adhesiveness” the phrenological term for masculine bonding. She could well credit the relationship, having seen the fond glances the two men exchanged. “That explains Henry’s presence. But what of yours?”

  Walt took Emily’s hands, as he had during their first tête-à-tête. “Emily, what I am about to confess to you, I have told no others. They think I am along simply to gain general wisdom that will strengthen my poetry. After all, what poet worth his salt would refuse to embark on a voyage to probe the afterlife?”

  Emily felt a pang, as if Walt were criticizing her own lack of enthusiasm for the expedition.

  Oblivious, Walt continued, “And in a sense, that is not a lie. After all, I have a duty to make my songs as true and brave as I can. Our country, the glorious poem known as America, is entering a perilous period, Emily. I can sniff as much in every Southern breeze, if you take my meaning. And my songs must be strong, to help carry America through her times of trouble.

  “But there is another, more personal reason for my wanting to visit Summerland.

  “You see, I need to speak to my father.”

  Walt paused, and took a deep breath before resuming.

  “My father died the very week my Leaves of Grass was first published. He never got a chance to see it, to see that I was making something of my life. He was a rough-hewn man, who measured success with his carpenter’s level, and I was always something of a disappointment to him. Not to my blessed mother—no, she always had faith in her favorite son, and she yet lives and is pleased by my work. But my father—Well, suffice it to say that I feel that there is an unresolved matter between us, and that if only I could speak to him again, I would be able better to live my life and sing my songs. Do you understand, Emily?”

  Now Emily was giddy, any slights forgotten. An ecstatic anguish raced through her veins. She should have known that Walt could have no ignoble motive for his involvement with the Poughkeepsie Seer and his entourage, no more than her brother did.

  Throwing her arms around his neck, Emily exclaimed, “Oh, Walt! I who have never had a real mother or father I could love or turn to can sympathize with you better than anyone! Please, please, forgive me for ever being so impertinently curious!”

  “It is not mine to forgive, nor is it even necessary. But I do.”

  Thrilled at his words and by
his rough-hewn, sweaty, aromatic closeness, Emily shut her eyes and waited expectantly.

  At that very moment she heard footsteps approaching.

  She and Walt hurriedly disengaged and stood up.

  It was only young Sutton.

  “The professor says ter kindly wake up the gypsy, Walt. They’re a-fixin’ to have a say-ants tonight!”

  8

  “THE SPIRIT LOOKS DOWN ON THE DUST”

  EMILY’S PARALYZING SHYNESS had prevented her from ever attending one of Sue Gilbert Dickinson’s “Noctes Ambrosiana,” whereat the cream of Amherst and visiting Boston society were wont to gaily disport themselves. Only through articles clipped from the Boston Transcript and pasted into her scrapbook—alongside journalistic eulogies, nature essays and comic japeries—did she share the excitement of those fêtes.

  But she imagined that no matter how thrilling and splendid those parties had been, none could have compared with the tension and excitement generated now by the strange accouterments and atmosphere and expectations in the converted parlor of The Evergreens.

  Heavy blood-red draperies had been closed to cut off all traces of moonlight—and much of the natural nocturnal noise. Cabalistic signs cut from paper had been hung with pushpins on the walls. A cone of what Davis had assured them, before leaving the room, was “genuine Hindoo incense” smoldered in a saucer, perfuming the air with pagan mystery. The only illumination came from a pair of thick corpse-pale candles.

  Why, it hardly seemed as if they were in New England any more!

  A flimsy sidetable had been pressed into service as the main prop. Around it were crammed seven chairs, five of which were occupied: along one side sat Emily and, on her left, Walt; clockwise from the Manahatta singer sat Sutton, Austin and Crookes. The two empty chairs intervened between this latter personage and Emily.

  Beneath the table the sitters’ knees pressed in an intimacy which, had their purposes not been strictly scientific, would have been most immodest.

  Emily could sense a strangeness in the air. It accorded with those rare solitary moments when she had sensed that the veil between the living and the dead was thinner than most people suspected—

  Of nearness to her sundered Things

  The Soul has special times—

  The Shapes we buried, dwell about,

  Familiar, in the Rooms—

  Untarnished by the Sepulchre,

  The Mouldering Playmate comes—

  In just the Jacket that he wore—

  Long buttoned in the Mold,

  Since we—old mornings, Children—played—

  Divided—by a world—

  Inclined by these premonitions to overcome her natural distaste of Madame Selavy and to give the French mystic all possible benefit of doubt, up till the final test, Emily waited patiently for the medium and her mentor to make their appearance, reminding herself that if her beloved Elizabeth Barrett could endure such foolishness, so could she.

  All participants, however, were not so easygoing.

  “What a damn fool way to settle a scientific matter!” exploded Professor Crookes, after some moments of painful squirming.

  An altercation between Davis and Crookes had arisen, concerning the exact placement of the ideoplastic tubes aboard the ship. Davis had argued for arranging them in a ritualistic pentagram, whereas Crookes had opted for a more Euclidean disposition designed to project their force symmetrically. Finally, both parties had agreed to arbitration by the spirit world—although Crookes appeared now to be regretting his decision.

  Before the naturalist could voice further petulance, however, the door opened and in walked the Seer of Poughkeepsie and Madame Selavy.

  Davis wore his usual suit and spectacles, but had crowned himself with a purple satin turban, its ends fastened with a large paste brooch. To Emily’s eyes, the whole affair suspiciously resembled a lady’s sash she had seen in the fashion pages of All The Year Round. Barefoot and bare-armed, Madame Selavy wore a flowing, loose-fitting white muslin robe. From the way in which her plentiful flesh jiggled beneath it, she had apparently abandoned all stays and corsets—the better, perhaps, to let the ideoplasm circulate. . . .

  Davis raised his hands in a gesture of blessing. “Madame Selavy’s meditation has placed her psyche in accord with the higher forces. She is now primed and ready to flow! In the name of Asar-Un-Nefer and Sekhet, of Alampis and Kobah, of Belial and Ishva-devata, let the gates now be thrown open!”

  Madame Selavy took her seat at the head of the table, placing her immediately at Emily’s right hand. Meanwhile, Davis erected a parchment screen in front of the two candles, plunging the room into further gloom. Then he took the last empty chair, between Crookes and the medium.

  “All please join hands, and seek to calm and open your minds. The spirits are extremely sensitive to negativity. And remember—under no conditions must you break the ring until the seance is officially terminated! I cannot be responsible for what might happen should you do so.”

  Emily thought that Davis had glared at her specifically at the mention of “negativity.” But the shadows were too thick to be certain.

  In any case, she now did as instructed: with her left hand she gripped Walt’s big paw; with her right she submitted to Madame Selavy’s plump and clammy grip.

  As soon as the circle was complete, a wind seemed to arise from nowhere, causing the candles to shudder. On Madame Selavy’s face appeared a look of tortured strain. Emily saw sweat spring out on her mustached upper lip.

  A series of loud raps suddenly sounded from a distant corner of the parlor! At the same time, the table jounced and bucked like a capering colt, through no apparent material intervention.

  Davis spoke in hushed tones. “The spirit guide, or epipsychidion, is now entering Madame’s very body.”

  The medium’s eyes rolled upwards, showing only white. Then, in a high girlish voice unlike her own deep timbre, she spoke.

  “Why Big Chief Davis call-um little Pink Cloud?”

  “Princess Pink Cloud! How grateful we are that you could reach us! We realize what an effort it is for you to disengage yourself from the splendors of Summerland to speak with us mere mortals—”

  Crookes interrupted. “Enough with the ghostly pleasantries! Ask her about the tubes!”

  Davis was imperturbed. “Princess Pink Cloud, my friend, although abrupt, has indeed raised the object of our conference. We need to know the proper disposition of the ideoplastic containers on our vessel. Would you kindly instruct us?”

  There was a pause. Then: “Ugh! Is hard to see—Wait! Make-um the sacred seal. But also put-um tubes high and low, to cover-um big canoe like a chief’s buffalo hide cover-um floor of teepee.”

  “Humph!” said Crookes, but appeared mollified at the compromise.

  “Thank you, Princess. You may leave now—”

  “Wait!”

  It was Austin. Emily winced at the contortions of grief evident on her brother’s face.

  “Please, can you give me a message from my unborn children? Do they know I’m coming to hold them?”

  “The little ones which the bad squaw kill-um wait-um for their father in happy hunting ground.”

  Tears coursed down Austin’s face. “Thank you, Princess, thank you—”

  Hardening her heart to Austin’s grief, Emily now spoke up in accordance with a plan she had secretly devised and kept hidden, even from Walt.

  “I too have a question for the spirit, if I may.”

  Davis hesitated a moment, then said, “Certainly. But I can guarantee nothing.”

  “I understand. Princess, my question is for Leonard Humphrey, my old teacher. Can you reach him?”

  Madame Selavy twisted and writhed before finally replying, “Yes, Leonard be-um with me here.”

  “Ask him please what he meant when he said to me that
my poems were ‘dross.’”

  “Ugh! Leonard make-um big apology. He say-um that he could not see-um their worth with living eye. But now he see-um they very good chants.”

  Emily smiled. “Thank you, Princess.”

  Humphrey had never said any such thing to Emily, had in fact never even seen any of her juvenile outpourings, for she had been too timid to disclose them.

  “If no one else has a question—Very well, we shall bring this seance to a close.”

  Madame Selavy spoke. “Princess Pink Cloud want-um to wave goodbye.”

  “An ideoplastic manifestation! We are honored, Princess!”

  Being closest to the medium, Emily was the first to spot the manifestation. The shadowy portion of the medium’s robe that stretched across her lap billowed and seemed to lift, taking shape as it grew. (Emily hated to think where the “ideoplasm” was supposed to be issuing from this time.) In a few seconds a shiny pale arm and hand wavered above the level of the table.

  “Goodbye, goodbye. I see-um you in Summerland—”

  Emily leaped to her feet, breaking her contact on both sides, and grabbed the ideoplastic limb.

  Madame Selavy screamed! The table was knocked over—by Davis, Emily later assumed, though at the time it seemed to leap of its own will—and general chaos reigned.

  By the time Walt had lit the whale-oil sconces on the wall, the tumult had died down.

  And there stood Emily, holding triumphantly aloft her prize.

  “Look!” she exclaimed. “A light armature on a telescoping rod, draped in wet muslin. I venture you’ll find a slit in her robe where it protruded, while she wiggled it with her toes!”

  The men had carried the seemingly unconscious Madame Selavy to a couch, where she lay prostrate. From his position of deep concern by her side, Davis now glared at Emily.

  “Of course that’s what it looks like now! Once you ruptured the link with the medium, without the proper ceremonies the ideoplasm reverted to its nearest earthly semblance! I only hope you haven’t killed her, with your sacrilegious disrespect!”